PS Alum Vanessa Vargas (MA '16)
PS Alum, Vanessa Vargas (MA '16), in collaboration with Betina Barrios Ayala, co-authored the article "A bridge over the ocean" that has been included, in English and Spanish, in the latest issue of Critical Correspondance: a web-based publication of Movement Research that provides a forum for diverse engagements with artistic practice, research, and the contexts that surround the field of dance. According to Nicole Soto Rodríguez, CC Co-editor "In this virtual exchange of correspondence Vanessa Vargas and Betina Barrios share their day to day experiences with each other. They remember moments lived when they were only a couple of miles apart and they still shared the same city skies. In the exchange of these digital letters they reveal ways in which they live as immigrants and how that influences their writing and the way they move. What supports them is their friendship, the bond that they have developed, the habit of reading and the sea".
Vanessa also published "Dance and performance: hand-to-hand between dance, performance and media" with ABediciones, the Andrés Bello University Press. The book proposes the review of intangible experiences, specifically dance and performance, as social forms of communication in their multiple and complex dimensions: the phenomenon of migration, the use of performance in protests in Venezuela, artistic processes in dance contemporary, censorship and sovereignty of the body in artistic practice, as well as the challenges and potential of the use of technologies and media in dance.
Vanessa Vargas (Caracas) is a dancer, journalist, teacher and researcher in living arts. Her work moves between theory and practice, examining dance and performance from choreography, journalism, cultural studies and social theory. As a dancer, she has collaborated in different exhibitions at the Brooklyn Museum and the MoMA in New York; which include works by Cecilia Vicuña, Lygia Clark, Yoko Ono and Simone Forti, among other artists. Her choreographic projects have been presented at the Festival de Jóvenes Coreógrafos (Caracas) Dixon Place, Triskelion Arts Center, Movement Research at Judson Church, Center for Performance Research, Pioneer Works, Performance Mix festival (NYC); and the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, as well as in different dance centers in Barcelona, Catalonia. In 2018 she obtained a scholarship and a residency in La Caldera (Barcelona), as part of the Barcelona International Dance Exchange. As a journalist, Vanessa works in areas such as curatorial research, media, communication and social research in the living arts, with emphasis on teaching dance and performance focusing on engaging the public, and creating an audience. She currently lives between Barcelona and New York, finishing her PhD in living arts at the University of Barcelona. In February 2023 she participated in the dance residency at Espai La Visiva, in the same city. She recently completed her second dance residency, at FreeZone Barcelona, developing a choreographic project that is part of her PhD research. As a living arts educator, researcher and academic, Vanessa presents lectures and facilitates workshops to merge theory and practice in the dance studio.